Self-report form of the Child Health Questionnaire in a Dutch adolescent population

The Child Health Questionnaire (CHQ)-87-item child and adolescent self-report (CF87) is an increasingly used health-related quality-of-life instrument for measuring the self-perceived physical and psychosocial well-being of children aged 10 years and older. The aims of this study were to evaluate structure, reliability and validity of the Dutch version of the CHQ-CF87 among adolescents in the general Dutch population. Thus, the study extends the data on the psychometric properties of the instrument and reports on the underlying structure and the applicability of the summary score measures, both of which were not reported in previously published studies. Questionnaires were sent to a random sample of 1696 adolescents aged 12-15 years, the response rate was 78%. The mean age of the resulting sample was 14 years and approximately half were boys. A large majority (95.2%) of the subjects were born in The Netherlands, 21% reported a chronic health condition. Results demonstrated good internal consistency of items and scales, and discriminant and concurrent validity. Factor analysis at scale level supported the measurement model of the CHQ for the secondary factors of physical health and psychosocial health. Factor analysis at item level yielded somewhat less univocal results. It is concluded that further evaluation of the CHQ-CF is recommended. Meanwhile, the results, together with the results of earlier studies, suggest that the instrument can be used in pediatric outcome studies, provided practitioners and researchers are aware of the reported limitations.

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